Sunday, November 6, 2011

If you are wondering how to pay for kids college tuition, we have answers for you. All it takes is a little financial planning. The earlier you can start to save for your child’s college tuition, the better.

If you have children and don’t have a college plan in place, you may want to start thinking about starting one soon. Here are 4 ways to prepare for your kid’s college education:

1. Start saving today. One thing is certain – you can never save too much money or plan too far ahead for your child’s education. College expenses are soaring around the country at all-time highs. It’s a good idea to create a college saving plan and implement it a soon as possible. Even saving a little each week is better than no savings at all.

2. Plan ahead. Many parents think planning ahead only means saving money. While this is true, there are other things you should take into consideration well before your child is ready for college. Colleges often require an application fee when your child submits their application for approval. If your child applies to several colleges or universities, these fees alone can add up very fast. Start checking into every aspect of the application and college processes. Educate yourself on these extra fees and expenses so that you can plan for them accordingly.

3. Don’t rely on school counselors alone. Be proactive in your child’s post-graduate education. School counselors can be helpful, but often have a huge workload. Stay in contact with your child’s school counselors, teachers and administrators. Ask how you can help, or what extra measures you need to take as a parent. Take an active part in learning what scholarship and financial aid programs your child should apply for. Your child may be able to apply for several types of financial aid regardless of your income.

4. Involve your kids. While you should take a hands-on approach to your kid’s college education, don’t do all the work for them. Let them fill out forms, pay application fees, and ask questions. Help them create a financial plan for their college years and even save up for some of the costs.

Saturday, October 29, 2011

Debt can be overwhelming, especially when we’ve taken on too much of it. It looms over our heads, overshadowing everything else at times. Getting into debt has become easier than it once was, and one of the results is more people who have trouble making ends meet.

It may seem impossible to get out of debt. But if the problem is recognized early on, it can be fairly simple to do so. If you have financial problems, here are five ways you can eliminate your debt and get your finances back where they should be.

1. Pay more than the minimum payments. Ideally, we should pay off our credit card balances every month, but sometimes we don’t or can’t. Paying more than just the minimum payment will allow us to pay off our debts much faster. It also has the potential to save us a lot of money, because the quicker we pay credit cards off, the less interest accrues.
This also holds true for mortgages, car loans, and any other type of loan. Some loans have prepayment penalties, but it’s best to avoid them anyway. For any loan that doesn’t, paying it off early is a good thing.

2. Cut back on your expenses, and put the extra money toward paying down your debt. If you examine your budget closely enough, you will likely find many areas where you could save money. Just taking your lunch to work instead of eating out can save you a substantial amount.

3. Sell things you don’t need. Do you have an extra vehicle, or anything else of value that you don’t use or need? Even just gathering up some things and having a yard sale could help you raise money to put toward your monthly payments. Every little bit helps.

4. Find ways to make extra money. You could take on a second job, do some babysitting, or sign up with a direct sales company. If you put all of your extra money toward paying off your debts, you shouldn’t need to do this for very long.

5. Consolidate your debts, but do so wisely. The best way to do this is to transfer all of your balances to a low-interest credit card. That will usually result in lower minimums, but keep on paying as much as you can to get the debt paid off. Avoid using home equity loans or other secured loans to consolidate if possible, because that will put your property at risk unnecessarily.

Getting out of debt may be easier than you think. Often a few minor adjustments are all that’s needed to eradicate a debt problem, especially if it is attended to early on. Then you can learn from your mistakes and keep your debt manageable.

Saturday, October 22, 2011

You’ve recognized that you have a debt problem, and you’ve come up with a plan to get rid of it. You’ve made a budget, you’ve cut back where you can, and you’ve allocated funds to put toward each of your bills each month. My best and most important tips to pay off debt all revolve around the same topic – Stick To Your Plan. Here they are.

Sticking with a debt relief plan is the hardest thing for many people to do. Part of the problem is that many debtors just aren’t good at managing their finances, and that is part of the reason they got in too much debt in the first place. Others had their debt under control until they lost a source of income, and they have trouble adjusting.

There are things we can do to help us stick to our debt relief plans. Here are some ideas:

* Eliminate the source of temptation. If you have trouble saying no to purchases when you have a credit card in your pocket, put all of the plastic away in a safe place. If just knowing where the credit cards are tempts you to use them, have your spouse or someone else you trust hide them.

* Write down all of your expenses. Many planners have budget pages you can use for this, but a notebook will work just fine as well. Writing down the exact amounts that we spend and what they were spent on holds us accountable, making us less likely to slip up.

* Close accounts when they are paid off. An account with a zero balance can be too much temptation for some people to withstand. If you think it will be too much for you, simply close the account and be done with it. Keeping only the account with the lowest interest or most favorable terms will allow you to obtain credit easily enough if you need it after you’re all caught up.

* Shred credit card and loan offers as soon as you get them in the mail. When you’re already in too much debt, the worst thing to do is to acquire the means to take on more.

* Don’t beat yourself up if you slip up. Just pick up where you left off and keep paying down that debt. Too often, debtors make mistakes and decide that it’s just too hard to pay their debts off, so they go back to their old habits. But one mistake is not the end of the world, and if you keep trying you will eventually eliminate your debt.

Coming up with an effective plan to pay off your debt is quite an accomplishment. Sticking with it can be difficult, but it is imperative if you want to get rid of your debt. By getting rid of temptation and holding ourselves accountable for our spending, we can greatly increase our chances of success.

Sunday, October 16, 2011

Foreclosure is a word that strikes fear into the hearts of homeowners. And unfortunately, it’s a word that we hear quite often these days. An alarming number of homeowners are going through it, or coming dangerously close.

In many cases, foreclosure is avoidable. But most homeowners have little or no knowledge about how to save their homes. This causes them to make mistakes that put them in even greater danger. Here are some common mistakes to avoid at all costs:

* Don’t wait until the sheriff is knocking on your door to get help. The time to start looking for solutions is when you first start having trouble keeping up with your payments. Unless you’re absolutely sure that it’s a temporary situation and you’ll be back on track next month, contact your lender immediately and discuss your options. If you can get something worked out before the foreclosure process begins, you’ll be more likely to keep your home.

* Don’t waste a lot of energy placing blame. Whether you think the foreclosure is your own fault, your spouse’s or someone else’s, playing the blame game will get you nowhere fast. Try to forgive yourself or the other party and work toward a solution.

* Don’t run from your lender. It’s easy to toss letters in the trash and stop answering the phone, but avoiding your lender won’t help matters. You need to explain your situation and try to get the lender to work with you. And you can’t accomplish that by giving them the silent treatment.

* Don’t agree to a payment plan you can’t afford. Lenders often propose that homeowners who have missed payments make increased payments for a while until they catch up. But if you could make more than your regular payment, you probably wouldn’t be in such a situation to start with. Don’t agree to an unaffordable payment plan just to get them off your back. Keep negotiating until they come up with something that you can afford.

* Don’t give the lender too much information. It’s important to be honest when answering the lender’s questions, but don’t provide information that they do not ask for. If you do, it could hurt your chances of getting your loan modified in a way that is acceptable.

* When requesting a loan modification, don’t rush through the paperwork. Make sure you fill everything out completely and accurately. If you have questions, ask. This is something that you need to do right the first time, because if you mess up, it could cost you time that you don’t have.

It can be difficult to keep your head on straight when you’re facing foreclosure. But do your best to remain calm and rational and avoid these mistakes. If you play your cards right, you can often prevent foreclosure and get back on track with your payments.

Tuesday, October 11, 2011

One way to repair your credit is to reconcile your debit. Here are some great tips on how you can start repairing your credit through debt consolidation.

Although everyone’s economic status and situation is particular, almost all of us are in some sort of debt at any given time. This can mean small debts like credit card bills or in-store financing, as well as larger ones like outstanding loans and mortgages. What this means is that almost everyone is dependent on being allowed a certain amount of credit, and without credit many things that you take for granted will become difficult. The key to your credit status at any given time is your credit report that is maintained by a credit bureau. Once you fall into default, or miss payments to your creditors, your credit bureau will receive notice and you will find yourself saddled with a poor credit rating. Effective credit repair involves many different steps, and is particular to each individual’s situation. A good solution for most people in terms of credit repair, however, is debt consolidation.

One of the most important things in credit repair is to act quickly. Although your credit rating will become damaged as soon as you begin to miss payments to your creditors, it will get continually worse if you continue to do so. Many people get confused into thinking that credit is either “good” or “bad,” and that once they get into trouble with a creditor it’s fruitless to try and rectify it. The opposite is true, however, so even if you are in bad standing with creditors, credit repair requires that you pay off your debts as quickly as possible.

The problem, of course, is that you probably don’t have the money to pay off the debts, after all, your economic situation probably was the reason for the missed payments in the first place. It is for this reason that debt consolation can be an excellent tool in credit repair. It works by consolidating all of your debts into one loan. In other words, if you have multiple outstanding debts, you take out a loan from one company, use that loan to pay the debts, and then make payments only on that loan.

What debt consolation achieves is some flexibility in situations where your debt is becoming unmanageable. Although you will ultimately owe the same amount of money, you could get a debt consolidation loan over a long term, so that your monthly payments will drop. Most importantly, debt consolidation immediately puts you back on solid footing with your creditors, and ultimately bodes well for credit repair. Things won’t be perfect, but your creditors will report that you have cleared up your debts, and so the process of credit repair can begin quickly.

Debt consolidation is an important tool in credit repair because it allows your status with creditors to change very quickly: you go from someone on bad terms with multiple creditors to someone on good terms with a single one. It allows you to stop the damage before things get out of hand, and gives you the breathing room you need to engage in credit repair. In this way intelligent debt consolation is a valuable tool in credit repair.

Thursday, October 6, 2011

Using the right motor oil can save you money on gas. Learn more about how the motor oil you use can make a difference in your car’s gas mileage.

When it comes to maintaining your car for fuel saving, using the right motor oil can make a real difference. Synthetic motor oil can vary widely, and along with it, so can the performance of your car. There are many manufacturers of motor oil out there today, but though there are many of them, not all of them are created equal. Smart car owners make sure that they keep well informed as to which synthetic motor oil will deliver the best performance.

First of all, I will offer you a little tutorial if you don’t know anything about motor oil. What is the difference between synthetic motor oil and non-synthetic motor oil if probably your first question. Basically, it’s the difference between synthetic oils and refined, or more often called mineral oils. All mechanical systems in your car such as engines and transmissions, are made up of many moving parts. When these parts come in contact with one another, they have to be able to move smoothly, with minimal friction or they will break. Friction causes your fuel efficiency to be decreased. This also causes overheating, and damage to these parts.

This is why some kind of oil is needed for so many mechanical systems. The more efficiently these moving parts move, the better the overall performance of the entire mechanical system will be. Without this much needed element in the system, the whole thing will not perform up to par, and it will wear down, and eventually destroy itself as a response. When it comes to the engine, transmissions and other car parts, the typical lubricant to use in your car is refined petroleum.

Petroleum is basically just refined from its regulated state by separating it into light and heavy sections, making it easier to run in machines than crude oil. Today, refined oil remains to be the cheapest type of lubricant to create for the manufacture. However, there are major problems that go along with using refined petroleum. Though the refining process can separate the oil by how heavy it is, it can’t distinguish among the widely different shapes that you find in mineral oils. These irregularities cause wear and tear on an engine, which messes up its parts.

The point here is that they had to make improvements on this motor oil. In the past thirty years, synthetic motor oil has been invented from a chemical, not mineral, process which helps to create molecules that are all the same size and shape. This new type of motor oil proved to be easier on engines, which lets them perform like they never could before, and in these new changes in motor oil, came a better running engine and more fuel efficient car.

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